(Fwd) summerschool on learning

------- Forwarded Message Follows ------- From: "Joachim Hoffmann" <hoffmann(a)psychologie.uni-wuerzburg.de> To: <Vlasta.Zupanc(a)guest.arnes.si>si>, <vbelop(a)psychol.ras.ru>ru>, <adio(a)psiho.ubb.soroscj.ro>ro>, <psycho(a)mail.sorosej.ro>ro>, <kowalczm(a)vm.amu.edu.pl>pl>, <EdNecka(a)apple.phils.uj.edu.pl>pl>, <dean(a)sci.psych.uw.edu.pl>pl>, <czigler(a)cogpsyphy.hu>hu>, <bernathl(a)kazy.elte.hu>hu>, <krisza(a)cortex.pote.hu>hu>, <pleh(a)edpsy.u-szeged.hu>hu>, <tiia(a)psych.ut.ee>ee>, <talis.B(a)lawinst.ee> Cc: "stock armin" <stock(a)psychologie.uni-wuerzburg.de>de>, "stoecker christian" <stoecker(a)psychologie.uni-wuerzburg.de>de>, "sebald albrecht" <sebald(a)psychologie.uni-wuerzburg.de> Subject: summerschool on learning Date: Thu, 27 Apr 2000 11:18:07 +0200 Importance: Normal Dear Colleagues, this is a message directed especially to all ESCOP member from the East-European coutries from whom we have an e-mail address available. Please distribute the information about the forthcoming summerschool on learning below to anyone in your country you know who might be interested in participating, and encourage her/him to apply. Please note, that the Volkswagen-Foundation supports the summerschool so that we can reimburse travelling as well as most of staying costs. We will be happy to receive at least some applications from students from your countries. See also the actual information at http://www.psychologie.uni-wuerzburg.de/summer_school/index.htm Best regards, Joachim **************************************************************************** *** Summer School on the topic "Learning: The Acquisition of Behavioral Competence" Call for Applications We are happy to announce that under the auspices of the European Society for Cognitive Psychology (ESCOP), the Department of Cognitive Psychology at the University of Würzburg is organizing a Summer School on the topic "Learning: The Acquisition of Behavioral Competence", funded by the Volkswagen Foundation. TIME: 22nd –27th of September 2000 PLACE: Department of Cognitive Psychology at the University of Wuerzburg Roentgenring 11 97070 Wuerzburg Germany AIM: The aim of the summer school is to provide a forum for young European scientists engaged in learning research for a discussion and exchange of ideas on current developments, methods, and applications, above all in the interconnected but still separated research areas of animal learning, associative learning in humans (including implicit learning), motor skill acquisition, learning to control voluntary behavior, perceptual learning, cortical stuctures involved in learning, and simulations of learning processes by connectionist networks and by adaptive algorithms in machine learning. LECTURERS AND CONTENTS: We are very pleased that a number of distinguished researchers will contribute to the summer school by reporting on their area of expertise: Prof. Axel Cleeremans: Free University Brüssel Learning and Consciousness in humans and computers: The implicit-explicit distinction; mental representation and consciousness; constrasting theories of implicit learning; direct vs indirect measures and the process dissociation procedure; abstraction in implicit learning and development; computational models of consciousness and their underlying assumptions; connexionist accounts of implicit learning; relationships between implicit learning and language acquisition, brain imaging studies of implicit vs. explicit learning. Prof. Mark Gluck: Center for Molecular & Behavioral Neuroscience, Rutgers University, New Jersey Cortico-Hippocampal Function in Associative Learning. Interdisciplinary approaches from psychobiology of animal learning, cognitive neuroscience of human memory, and neurocomputational modeling. Prof. Joachim Hoffmann: Universität Würzburg Learning to control voluntary behavior: The ideomotor hypothesis of bidirectional action-effect associations as the basis of voluntary behavior. The influence of contingent action effects on the acquisition of behavioral competence. The formation of conditionalized action-effect relations. The function of effect anticipations in initiating actions. Simulations of the formation of S-R-O units and applications in robotics. Prof. Claes von Hofsten: Uppsala University Motor Learning and skill development: The evolution of action systems. The principles of dynamic systems applied to the development of actionsystems. What are the consequences? The origin of action in development is action. The action systems of newborn infants. A basic principle of action development is that actions develop throughactions. The emergence of prospective control.Development of particular action systems (basic orientation, looking, and reaching). Relationship between perception, action, and cognition in development. Questions of nature-nurture and innate knowledge. Prof. Jean-Arcady Meyer: AnimatLab-Lip6, University of Paris 6, Paris A review of on-line and situated learning in animats: learning in neural networks and in classifier systems. 1. Learning at the level of the individual: non-supervised learning and reinforcement learning. Applications to learning of cognitive maps for navigation, and to learning in motivationally autonomous animats. 2. Learning at the level of the species: evolutionary design of control architectures and/or morphologies. 3. Interactions between learning, evolution and development, Baldwin effect. Prof. John M. Pearce: University of Wales Associative learning in animals: Basic phenomena and the Rescorla-Wagner theory. The role of attention in animal learning. The distinction between elemental (feature or distributed) and configural (exemplar or localist) theories of associative learning. The role of context in associative learning. Conditional and hierarchical accounts of association formation. Prof. Philippe G. Schyns: University of Glasgow Perceptual learning in categorizations: Categorization is a fundamental process whereby variable perceptual inputs are progressively reduced to a small number of equivalence classes, called "categories." How do theorists frame the categorization problem so that variable face, object and scene information is stabilized for higher-level processing? One approach suggests that perception delivers a fixed set of features which are treated as inputs to categorization processes. I will question this unidirectionality and argue instead that perceptual organization is intimately linked with the categorization being accomplished. Prof. David R. Shanks: University College, London Associative learning processes in humans: Normative accounts of elementary learning. Contrasting associative and nonassociative models of elementary learning processes. Representational issues in learning. Learning, performance, priming, and awareness. Multiple indices of awareness and their relation to learning. The implicit-explicit distinction in amnesia. FUNDING: We expect participants to make use of all possibilities to gain external funding. For those participants who do not receive financial support from elsewhere, we are able to contribute to travel and accomodation costs, thanks to the Volkswagen Foundation. Support should be sufficient to cover travel costs from European countries, accomodation at a local youth hostel and lunch. APPLICATION PROCEDURE: The number of participants is limited to 40. Graduate students and post-docs who are doing research on the topic ”Learning” are invited to apply. Participants should not be older than 33. The application should entail a CV, a publication list, a short description of current research interests, and an abstract for a poster. A recommendation from a senior researcher is welcome. Applications will be considered in the order of reception date and with regard to the quality of the abstracts as well as to the relevance of research interests. Applications should be sent to the following address: Prof. Joachim Hoffmann Universitaet Wuerzburg, Psychologie III, Roentgenring 11, D - 97070 Wuerzburg, GERMANY DEADLINE: Applications should be submitted by May 15, 2000. Applicants will be notified about admission by May 30, 2000. See also the actual informations at: http://www.psychologie.uni-wuerzburg.de/summer_school/index.htm -- Istvan Czigler PhD DSc Institute for Psychology of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences Mail: P.O.Box 398 H-1394 Budapest, Hungary Phone: (36-1) 1533 244 Fax: (36-1) 2692 972 e-mail: czigler(a)CogPsyPhy.hu